Labour's new appointment shows focus on violence against women and girls

It's easy to get cynical when politicians trumpet yet another crackdown on this, or action plan on that – if you watch long enough you'll see the same subjects come up every few years, with a depressing absence of discernible improvement in the problem being tackled between each proud pronouncement.

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So it's heartening this week to hear about something that's not been done before: the creation by the Labour party of the position of shadow minister for preventing violence against women and girls.

Seema Malhotra, the first MP in the role, will work on the prevention of, and responses to, rape, domestic and sexual violence, female genital mutilation, forced marriage and trafficking, as well as on prostitution policy.

Seema Malhotra / Facebook

It's simple enough to invent shadow roles when your party's not in government and you don't have to make laws or take responsibility for any failings, critics might say. But it's thought that if Labour wins next year's election, it will appoint a Home Office minister to do the same job.

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At the moment, these issues are just one part of a huge list of topics covered by the crime prevention minister, Norman Baker – alongside forensic science, car crime, homelessness and reform of the British Transport Police, to name but a few.

And the Coalition government, bizarrely, has tended to give the role of minister for women and equalities to someone who's doing a much wider job. At the moment it's Nicky Morgan, who's also busy being Education Secretary – one of the biggest jobs in the cabinet. Before her there was Maria Miller – combining it with the apparently pretty unrelated role of Culture Secretary – and before that, Home Secretary Theresa May.

But why should one area of crime get special treatment over many others, those critics might ask? Well, perhaps that's necessary if the devastating affect it has on thousands of women in the UK is to be taken seriously enough by the authorities.

Malhotra is likely to face an uphill struggle to shift public attitudes in some quarters

Earlier this year, a damning report by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) revealed that only eight out of the 43 forces in England and Wales responded well to domestic abuse. While most of them had claimed domestic abuse was a priority, this often wasn't matched in reality on the ground; in fact it was still frequently a "poor relation" to other policing activity.

Malhotra is likely to face an uphill struggle to shift public attitudes in some quarters. Comments she made explaining that constant criticism of women's weight and appearance by a partner can be part of emotionally abusive, controlling behaviour have already been presented as "husbands who tell their wives they're fat may be guilty of domestic abuse" – with the predictable backlash from the Twittersphere's less well evolved contributors.

But the creation of her role is a welcome step towards putting violence against women, and the way victims are treated, under the harsh spotlight they need. Let's hope the job is here to stay.